Lean Design and Construction

As a founding member of the Lean Construction Institute, Southland has long embraced the lean principles as part of our core operating philosophy. We continuously seek the systematic removal of waste in our processes and efficient use of materials, resources, and personnel to improve our performance as an organization. By applying lean principles over the past 15 years, Southland’s efforts have directly translated to the following benefits for our business partners and clients:

Process Improvement—As a design-build-maintain provider, Southland has the opportunity to leverage lean principles throughout each stage of the building lifecycle in order to fully maximize the lean approach. A centerpiece of this effort lies within our building information modelingstrategy, which focuses on a single model that satisfies the needs of engineering, fabrication, construction, and maintenance. This effort reduces significant waste, aligns project goals, and improves communication amongst the entire team, while providing clients with a faster and more flexible delivery model that reduces cost and improves schedule.

Efficient Use of Materials—Working to reduce the use of raw materials, Southland starts with the appropriate selection and design of innovative HVAC, plumbing, and fire protection systems and utilizes prefabrication and modular construction to eliminate redundant support systems and improve coordination. Through our extensive use of virtual construction, we ensure systems are coordinated while mitigating potential rework and waste on the jobsite. With state-of-the-art fabrication facilities, Southland also eliminates scrap and raw material waste, along with its associated energy, labor, and ongoing operational costs.

Integrated Schedules—Southland recognizes that integrated schedules improve communication and maximize the efficient use of resources for all phases of a project. Our deep understanding of the design, coordination, fabrication, and construction process coupled with our use of technology and lean tools provides the unique opportunity to plan, communicate, and track our progress across the entire project. In doing so, we are able to further optimize the project schedule, improve communication, and assist the entire team on meeting schedule commitments to our clients.

Productive Workforce—Essential to remaining competitive and cost effective in our industry, Southland invests heavily in the continual training of our employees to keep pace with the rapidly changing technology, means and methods, and tools available today. Our lean approach naturally focuses attention on prefabrication and modular construction to leverage improvements in quality, safety, productivity, and scheduling in the use of our fabrication facilities, while our efficient scheduling techniques allow Southland to retain talented employees through varying work cycles.

Cost Savings—The culmination of our process improvements, efficient use of materials, increased productivity, and efficient scheduling tools not only directly reduces costs for Southland, but also for our project team members and the owner.

Recent Work

About Southland

As one of the nation's largest MEP building systems experts, Southland Industries provides innovative, practical results for your engineering, construction, building systems integration, and energy needs.